It is well known in a multicolor photographic material of the type that color-forming couplers are present in silver halide photographic light-sensitive emulsions and developed using a color developing agent such as p-phenylenediamine, etc., that the oxidation product of a color developing agent transfers into an adjacent image-forming layer to form an undesirable dye, i.e., a so-called "color turbidity" (color mixing) phenomenon. It is also known that an undesirable "color fog" phenomenon occurs due to air oxidation of a color developing agent and the fog of silver halide emulsions at color development. Hereinafter, "color turbidity" and "color fog" are generally called "color stain".
The use of various kinds of hydroquinones has hitherto been proposed to prevent the formation of color stain. For example, the use of mono-straight chain alkylhydroquinones is described in U.S. Pat. No. 2,728,569; Japanese Patent Publication (Unexamined) No. 106,329/'74, etc., and the use of mono-branched alkyl hydroquinones is described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,700,453; West German Patent Application (OLS) No. 2,149,789; Japanese Patent Publication (Unexamined) No. 156,438/'75, etc. Also, the use of di-straight chain alkyl hydroquinones is described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,728,657 and 2,732,300; U.K. Pat. Nos. 752,146 and 1,086,208; Chemical Abstracts, Vol. 58, 6367h, etc., and the use of dibranched alkyl hydroquinones is described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,700,453 and 2,732,300; U.K. Pat. No. 1,086,208; Chemical Abstracts, Vol. 58, 6367h, Japanese Patent Publication (Unexamined) No. 156,438/'75; Japanese Patent Publication Nos. 21,249/'75; 40,818/'81, etc. Furthermore, the use of alkyl hydroquinones as color stain preventing agents is described in U.K. Pat. Nos. 558,258; 557,750 (corresponding to U.S. Pat. No. 2,360,290); 557,802; 731,301 (corresponding to U.S. Pat. No. 2,701,197); U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,336,237; 2,403,721; and 3,582,333; West German Patent Application (OLS) No. 2,505,016 [corresponding to Japanese Patent Publication (Unexamined) No. 110,337/'759; and Japanese Patent Publication No. 40,816/'81.
It is known that the "color turbidity" phenomenon occurs in color diffusion transfer photographic materials as in ordinary color photographic materials and to prevent the occurrence of the color turbidity, the foregoing hydroquinones are used. Hydroquinones used as a color turbidity preventing agent for color diffusion transfer photographic materials are described in Japanese Patent Publication (Unexamined) No. 21,249/'83.
Moreover, the use of sulfonamidophenols as a color turbidity preventing agent for color diffusion transfer photographic materials is described in Research Disclosure, 15162 (1973), page 83; Japanese Patent Publication (Unexamined) Nos. 72,158/'80 and 24,941/'82 (corresponding to U.S. Pat. No. 4,366,226).
Recently, in producing color photographic materials, it has been strongly desired for obtaining high quality color photographs to develop a new color stain preventing agent which more effectively prevents the occurrence of color stain without reducing the photographic sensitivity, which can be incorporated in a photographic material having thinner photographic layers for improving the sharpness of images formed, does not change the property thereof when it is stored for a long period of time, and further contributes to the improvement of the light fastness of dye images formed by color development.